Watch Real Time with Bill Maher

May 10, 2013

New Rules

New Rule: [slide of Ariel Castro] If you want to avoid being accused of kidnaping girls and keeping them chained in your basement, you have to make at least some effort to not look exactly like the kind of guy who would kidnap girls and keep them chained in your basement.

Also, and this goes out to all his brothers--[mug shots of Castro and two other suspects]--in your mug shots, try not to look like every mechanic who ever told me my car is not ready.

New Rule: [slide of Honey Boo Boo's mother's wedding] Conservatives must admit that a gay wedding cannot be as bad as this. This is Honey Boo Boo's mother, Mama June and her beau Sugar Bear, and they've tied the knot. And why not? They're so in love, sometimes they finish each other's sandwiches.

Congratulations! I now pronounce you wife and greeter at Home Depot. Such a politically-correct group today.

New Rule: Republicans trying to turn the Benghazi attacks into a scandal that taints Hillary's chances at a 2016 presidential run must realize that scandals don't weaken Hillary Clinton. They only make her stronger!

If the Republicans keep this up, she'll not only be president, she'll appoint Bill to the Supreme Court.

New Rule: [slide of Christian heavy metal singer Tim Lambesis] If you're a Christian heavy metal singer like this clod is, and you're accused of hiring a guy to kill your wife, as this clod was, you have to admit you're really just a "regular" heavy metal singer.

Come on, dude, read your Bible. God says you're not allowed to kill your wife...unless she's...[screen crawl lists books of Bible where passages are cited]...gay, cheating, a witch, a fortune-teller, not a virgin, worshiping another god, worshiping no god, cursing her dad, hitting her dad, ignoring a priest, approaching the tabernacle....or working on Sunday.

Otherwise, hands off. Oh, and Ecclesiastes says, "The wind continuously blows." But not as hard as Christian rock.

New Rule: Now that Martha Stewart is on Match.com, she must realize that dating has changed and heed the following helpful hints. Old condom wrappers can be woven into shiny, decorative drink coasters. And you can microwave your lube for 30 seconds to heighten the intensity of the experience.

The median age of a fast-food worker is now 28. At the end of the order, they say, "Do you want one of my kids with that?"

And, finally, New Rule: Since the average CEO now makes 380 times the wage of the average worker, if you want to modernize The Great Gatsby, don't just show the rich exploiting the poor, show the rich eating them! [slide from zombie movie]

Yes, a new version of The Great Gatsby opened today, a fond look back at a gilded age when the very rich ran their big, pretty cars right over the very poor. And that was supposed to make you sad. For the rich. Or the car, I can't quite remember.

But, the point is, Gatsby isn't really accurate for today, because the wealth gap now is so much more profound than it was even in the 1920s. The average "sales associate" at Walmart makes $8.81 an hour. While the six heirs to the Walmart fortune are worth $90 billion. The same as the bottom 130 million Americans.

Yes, the have-nots are getting a lot have-not-ier. And, not just at Walmart. One in four Americans makes less than ten dollars an hour; 146 million -- about half the country -- do not have enough to meet basic needs.

And, I say, if you don't want to pay people, just go all the way and do what we do here in Hollywood, and call them "interns."

Look at fast-food jobs. It used to be they were the extra jobs our kids would do to earn money for gas and weed. So they weren't using up all of mom and dad's.

Adults worked actual jobs. But, now the economy is such that the fast-food jobs ARE the actual jobs. The median age of a fast-food worker is now 28. At the end of the order, they say, "Do you want one of my kids with that?"

And they're the lucky ones. There's now a web service called SeekingArrangements.com that matches rich men with cash-strapped college girls. He provides tuition money and she provides--[air quotes "companionship." It's one hand washing the other. Only, in the case of one of the hands, it's a penis.

Or, Google the words, "McDonald's prostitute" and you'll see stories about women being arrested for offering sex in exchange for a Happy Meal. Google "self surgery" and you'll see people operating on themselves because they have no healthcare.

Families are literally eating cat food. I mean, something is really now right when the kids hear the can opener and start rubbing themselves against your shin.

And the older kids? Forty-two percent of recent college grads live in the houses they grew up in because they cannot afford rent anywhere else. And it's really creepy when you're a coed trolling for a sugar daddy on SeekingArrangements.com, and you get an IM from your actual dad downstairs saying, "Dammit, honey, I'm already paying your rent!"

There was a story recently about a Georgia man whose home was in foreclosure, savings running out, so he called 911. And when the responders arrived, he took them hostage. His demands? Getting his electricity turned back on.

Now, I'm not saying that's a smart approach. But, squeezing people economically so tight that they go all 'Django Unchained,' that's not smart either.

If you're rich, you should be begging the government to redistribute your wealth. Because you know what happens in countries where there's a huge disparity between the rich and the poor? The rich get kidnapped.

It happens 72 times a day in Mexico. Getting snatched out of your car is so common in South Africa that they actually make cars that do this.

[CLIP SHOWN: Figure stands next to car as car emits blasts of jets of flames to either side, engulfing figure.] [back to live]

Do you really think your trophy wife is going to empty out the Swiss bank account to save your sorry ass? I'm talking to you, Donald Trump. Think about it.

And, remember the difference between a mosquito and a hedge fund manager, is a mosquito will stop sucking blood before it explodes.

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